Ninety-five years ago the Royal Commission on Transport condemned trams to a lingering death. The commission’s press release said trams should be abolished as soon as possible. The commission’s report was a watershed moment.

The shenanigans that led up to this verdict are revealed for the first time in my new book The Great Tramways Conspiracy.

Here’s a taster.

Tram managers, the trade union representing tram workers, civil servants from the Ministry of Transport and independent transport economists all told the commission that modern trams had a bright future.

But the commission discounted this heavyweight evidence. It preferred second-hand tittle-tattle, the specious claims of motoring journalists and the insidious impact of an oil-industry-backed publicity campaign that smeared trams as old-fashioned.

The commission concluded that ‘tramways, if not an obsolete form of transport, are at all events in a state of obsolescence’.

It was an uncanny echo of the words in a book called The Problem of Motor Transport, which claimed trams were ‘in danger of becoming obsolete, or at any rate obsolescent’.

This book was the work of a Shell propagandist. And to make sure the commission got the message, the petrol retailing company sent every commissioner a copy of the book.

In truth, the commission needed little persuasion. At a time when only one in 20 adults had a car, 11 out of 12 commissioners were motorists, and like their fellow drivers, they hated trams.

In the 1920s Britain’s tramways had been growing steadily. Some had closed, but more systems were being extended. And new trams were still being built. But after the commission had reported Britain’s trams were heading for the scrapyard.